


For The Ones Who Can't Pick Themselves Up Off The Ground

by MadHattie



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Emotional, Gen, post the eleventh hour, sad but sweet, spoilers for petals to the metal, thanks d & d podcast for making me cry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 14:59:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8990548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadHattie/pseuds/MadHattie
Summary: Amidst all the chaos following the events at Refuge, Magnus goes to visit some old friends





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from the song Switzerland by The Last Bison

Magnus isn’t one to take trips planet-side. Merle goes down to visit his kids that he thinks nobody knows about, and Taako goes on periodic shopping sprees whenever he decides that there isn’t enough crap in his room already. Magnus though, he’s fine with staying put. As long as he has a project to work on, which is almost all the time now that he has his pocket workshop, he has no reason to leave the moon base. 

Ever since what happened at Refuge, though, he’s been feeling unsettled. There are too many loose ends, too many things that don’t make sense. He needs to get away from the strangeness of the Bureau and find something else to focus on.

 

There are very few places left that mean something to him. Goldcliff is one of them.

It’s been almost a year since the three of them left, long enough for the cherry tree to blossom once again. Magnus isn’t quite sure how much the people in town know now that the voidfish has erased all trace of the Gaia Sash. Do they remember Hurley and Sloane? Do they remember how much they loved each other, and how they fought so goddamn hard to overcome what fate threw at them? After everything that happened, will anyone remember their names?

If nothing else, the people of Goldcliff remember the tree. Someone has built a path out to it since he was last here, a crooked line of planks that stand barely above the water’s surface, just high enough to keep his feet dry. It stops just before it reaches the tree’s tangled roots, as if the builder was afraid to intrude. Magnus steps off the edge of the platform without hesitation, letting the cool water seep into his boots. The roots are raised and gnarled, providing a seat that’s only slightly damp. Magnus sits and takes it all in. The two masks are still nestled right at the base of the tree, seemingly untouched since he was last here. They’re so beautiful that Magnus wonders why nobody has stolen them. And then his eyes pick out a shape in the bark, and he remembers.

You can’t really see the two of them unless you know to look, but once you know every detail seems to stand out. Hurley is curled up in Sloane’s arms, her head tucked under Sloane’s chin. On her face Magnus thinks that he can see the ghost of a smile. Sloane’s features are harder to distinguish. You can see the tip of a pointy ear, the shape of what was once a ponytail, but the rest of her is so deeply intertwined with Hurley that it’s hard to tell where one of them ends and the other begins.

 

“Hello Hurley, Sloane,” he begins, still not entirely sure what he’s doing. “I don’t know if you remember me, but I’m Magnus. My friends and I came in towards the end of this mess, but we couldn’t stop it soon enough. But that’s all in the past, and you can’t change the past, right?” He laughs without humor. “Actually, that’s kind of the thing I wanted to talk to you about.

“When all of this shit went down, at first all I could feel was jealousy. It’s kind of stupid; I mean, the two of you pretty much died, but you died together and I… I never had that option.

“The first year after I lost Julia was the worst year of my life. I was constantly chasing the what-ifs. What if I had killed Cailin in the first place so that he never had a chance to retaliate? What if I have been there to defend Raven’s Roost? What if I had been able to hold Julia as the column collapsed around us?” He sighs heavily and rubs his eyes. “That last one was the most appealing, because that would mean that I had died, and in that moment living without her was the most painful thing in the world. 

“That was how I felt for a while. Not anymore, don’t worry! But when I saw the two of you go together it brought some of those feelings back. Because for all the awful things that you had to go through, neither of you had to live without the other, and I was jealous of that. 

“So I just wanted to say sorry. I was jealous, and I never acted on it, but it was still a shitty way for me to feel, especially considering that I wasn’t able to help you.  
“And you know what?” Magnus heaves a shuddering breath, trying his best not to let his voice waver. “Someone gave me the chance to go back and explore those “what if’s”, and I didn’t take it. Because if I did, then that would mean that I wouldn’t be allowed to help people like you, and that’s not what Julia would have wanted.” He leans back on his root perch and looks up at the branches swaying peacefully in the breeze, so unlike the women he had known, filled to the brim with adrenaline and determination. 

“Anyway,” Magnus reaches up and scratches the back of his neck “I got a bit off track there, but I did have something that I wanted to give you.” From the pouch on his belt he pulls out two small wooden figures: a raven and a ram, both carved in intricate detail. He finds a large knothole above the water and places the two figures so that they nestle together.

“Contrary to popular belief, I don’t just carve ducks.”

He presses his hand against the bark one last time, just above where Sloane’s head would be.

_Thanks Magnus._

Magnus pulls his hand back in surprise and looks around. The area is empty save for him. In the back of his mind he hears a woman laugh. A cherry blossom petal falls and lands right on the tip of his nose, almost teasing him.

_Don’t worry about us, you big goof. We’re fine. Just remember to take care of yourself. You don’t want to make Julia worry._

Magnus smiles, his eyes threatening to overflow. “You’re right. Thanks guys.”

_No problem, dude. And hey, don’t be a stranger, okay? We’re not going anywhere._

Magnus winces. 

_Whoops, sorry. That was a little tasteless. But like we said, don’t worry about us. We’re happy like this. And if you three hadn’t intervened, then something much worse might have happened. So thanks for that._

“Uh, you’re welcome, I guess.” Magnus’s smile returns, but the tears don’t. “Do you want me to bring the other two the next time I come?”

_We would love that_

**Author's Note:**

> Nobody seems to agree on how to spell the Mad Governor's name, but I once knew someone whose name was pronounced the same way, and she spelled it Cailin, so that's the spelling I used


End file.
